by Frank Schnittger
Wed Apr 23rd, 2025 at 04:57:19 PM EST
(ARINS = Analysing and Researching Ireland North and South)
On 1. September 2024 I published a blog on Slugger O'Toole entitled A blog policeman's lot is not a happy one in which I discussed the many tactics a savvy contributor to a blog discussion can adopt to get around the rules, or otherwise subvert good faith, evidence based debate.
by Frank Schnittger
Tue Mar 11th, 2025 at 05:12:02 PM EST
Arnold Carton has written a very perceptive OP entitled "The problem with Y" in which he discusses the difficulties boys have in educational environments, with some research showing that having a Y chromosome can be as big a disadvantage as coming from a deprived social or economic background.
by Frank Schnittger
Mon Mar 10th, 2025 at 01:53:20 PM EST
In my previous blog here: Speaking right: What an Taoiseach should say in Washington I gave an account of my experiences in speech writing and the many lessons I have learned about that craft, often the hard way through some of the mistakes I have a made.
by Frank Schnittger
Sat Mar 8th, 2025 at 09:17:25 AM EST
In a former life I was, for my sins, a speech writer and video producer for three successive Managing Directors of Guinness, later to become Diageo. The job was to promote the brand, to burnish the image of the gentlemen in question, to thank a lot of people, and to have something to say of relevance to the intended audience. In other words, to connect with the audience.
by Frank Schnittger
Thu Mar 6th, 2025 at 11:57:33 AM EST
Cross at Béal na Bláth commemorating where Michael Collins, , Chairman of the Provisional Government and Commander-in-chief of the National Army, was killed nearby in August 1922
Writing in the Irish Times, former Tánaiste Michael McDowell makes no bones about it.
"To call Volodymyr Zelenskiy`s meeting with Donald Trump in the Oval Office a "shouting match", as many commentators managed to whitewash it, is a lie. It was a unilateral, vicious, premeditated political ambush - a mugging aimed at the political destruction of Zelenskiy in the eyes of the world - and in the eyes of his own people. It was as disgusting as it was shameful.
Trump is publicly showing himself to possess characteristics many of us have for years discerned in him: sociopathic, bullying, ruthless, selfish and destructive traits. These were identified in the perceptive pen portrait of him written by his own niece Mary Trump.
While his first term in office fizzled out electorally in a clownish orgy of sackings of nearly all those whom he had appointed to hold high office, he has now surrounded himself with a circus of super-wealthy, unqualified sycophants whose full-time activity is competitive adulation of their ringmaster's folly."
by Frank Schnittger
Wed Mar 5th, 2025 at 11:50:06 AM EST
Andy Pollak's latest excellent and thought provoking offering, Beyond Borders: Building an All-Ireland Forum on Shared Values..., generated the usual animated debate with many of the 565 comments (including mine) taking issue with aspects of his argument. But few if any, engaged with his central proposal that the time had come for a new all Ireland Forum focusing on the shared values we all have in common on this island. Andy characterised those values as "peace, democracy, equality, community, environmental sustainability, Christianity in all its forms, and European-ness - which the great majority of Irish people, north and south, have in common."
by Frank Schnittger
Sun Mar 2nd, 2025 at 10:02:41 AM EST
President Trump's closing, dismissive, argument to President Zelenskyy is that "you don't have the cards" to play the tough guy with Putin. Only with America's help can the Ukraine continue to resist the Russian invasion and without it, things will get pretty ugly. Settle now on America's terms by handing over the mineral rights to your own country or America will do a deal behind your backs to legitimate the Russian invasion and cede the occupied territories to Russia.
by Frank Schnittger
Tue Feb 18th, 2025 at 08:57:52 PM EST
I sent the letter below to the editors of the Irish Times, Independent, News, Examiner and Belfast Telegraph. It is a little on the long side for a letter, and none saw fit to publish it. Having had hundreds of letters published and more rejected, I do not take such rejection personally. Letter's page editors tend to focus on one theme at a time, and between Trump's shenanigans and numerous scandals closer to home, they have not been short of material.
by Frank Schnittger
Sun Feb 16th, 2025 at 09:37:13 AM EST
When you grow up and live in a country for long enough, you get to take many aspects of life there for granted. They are the universal normal as far as you are concerned. Of course, when you travel to other countries you can see that many things are quite different there and that can be refreshing and interesting. Working and living in another country can give you a deeper perspective on differences still.
by Frank Schnittger
Mon Feb 10th, 2025 at 07:22:40 PM EST
The North and South series is a collaboration between The Irish Times and ARINS (Analysing and Researching Ireland North and South), a joint research project of the Royal Irish Academy (RIA) and the Keough-Naughton Centre for Irish Studies at the University of Notre Dame. For three years now it has been publishing simultaneous surveys of Ireland, north and south, on attitudes to reunification as well as some more qualitative studies. The 2024 surveys, just published, were conducted by Ipsos and surveyed more than 1,000 voters at multiple points across both jurisdictions and yielded the following results:
by Frank Schnittger
Thu Feb 6th, 2025 at 06:50:58 PM EST
For many years, the Israeli far right have debated how to clear all of Palestine of Palestinians and give Jews untrammeled control of all of the territory as part of a one state Greater Israel project. 2.7 million Palestinians have already been displaced into refugee camps in Jordan and illegal Jewish settlements have steadily encroached on further Palestinian settlements, land, and precious freshwater sources throughout the region. While officially Israel has not rejected the UN favoured "two state solution," in practice it has made it impossible because there simply isn't one contiguous territory for Palestinians to occupy any more.
by Frank Schnittger
Fri Jan 31st, 2025 at 09:59:29 AM EST
In the 142 year history of the Home Nations, 5 Nations, and 6 Nations since 1883, no country has won the competition outright three years in a row. Granted, there were rare occasions when the Championship was at least shared three times in a row, before try bonus points and points differences were entered into the equation. But it is a measure of just how difficult this task is that Ireland could be the first country to win it outright three years in a row.
by Frank Schnittger
Tue Jan 28th, 2025 at 11:12:00 PM EST
Cross posted from Slugger O'Toole where there are 400 comments and counting.
The core of Woke is about respect for others, and especially others of a different gender, sexuality, identity, race, country of origin, religion, linguistic preference, culture or demographic. Most of us have no problem with that. But there was also a veritable industry supporting the development of those values in academia, non-governmental agencies (see equality agencies), public services, and latterly, in large corporations. A cancel culture developed around this industry whereby anyone who doesn't fully subscribe to this ideology could find themselves losing platforms they previously had access to. It was good marketing to be seen to be on board.
by Frank Schnittger
Fri Jan 24th, 2025 at 05:12:21 PM EST
Many Americans I meet in Europe are embarrassed by Trump and say that he doesn't represent the real America. When you consider that he has always had negative approval ratings, including throughout his entire first term and during the 2024 election campaign, they may have had a point. Gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the preponderance of smaller states with Republican majorities have enabled Republicans to gain control of the Presidency for his first term, and Congress, the Senate, and consequently the Supreme Court despite being behind in the popular vote.
by Frank Schnittger
Sat Jan 18th, 2025 at 11:03:33 PM EST
One of my former managers had a catchphrase to the effect that one of the qualities that characterised your potential to rise to senior management was the ability to tolerate ambiguity. The greater one's responsibilities became, the less black and white the choices become. You have to be able to tolerate situations where there are many competing points of view and no right answers. The solutions are at best messy compromises which may have to be tweaked from time to time as circumstances change.
He rose to the top of the management tree, so he should know.
by Frank Schnittger
Wed Jan 15th, 2025 at 05:29:59 PM EST
The Six nations squads have been announced and bar the usual injuries, not many surprises are contained therein. Ireland seek to win the Six Nations for an unprecedented third time in a row without their head coach, Andy Farrell, who is away on Lion's duty, and with a tough match against England in Lansdowne Rd. to start the ball rolling. Tough assignments against a resurgent Scotland away and a France team this year featuring the world's best player, Antoine Dupont, will also present a difficult challenge. Italy have been improving in recent seasons, but Wales are in the doldrums having lost their last 12 tests in a row.
by Frank Schnittger
Wed Jan 8th, 2025 at 11:10:21 PM EST
The Irish exchequer recorded a record surplus of €12.8 Billion in 2024, helped in no small measure by a one off receipt of €11 Billion in tax arrears from Apple following a ruling of the European Court of Justice. Even without that bonanza, corporate taxes increased by 18% to €28.1 Billion, Income Tax rose by 6.6% to €35.1 Billion, VAT receipts increased by 7.3% to €21.8 Billion, Excise duties were up 11.8% to €6.3 Billion and sundry other tax receipts were up by 6.9% to €5.8 Billion.
by Frank Schnittger
Tue Dec 31st, 2024 at 10:20:33 AM EST
Arnold Carton recently had an excellent OP up comparing Donald Trump to Julius Caesar and noting that there is sometimes no turning back from Republican to dictatorial Imperial rule. Another less talked about aspect of the fall of the Roman Empire was the ruinous cost of conducting so many military campaigns with succeeding Emperors (who often only lasted a few months before being killed by rivals or their own men) simply issuing more currency to finance them.
by Frank Schnittger
Wed Dec 11th, 2024 at 09:31:00 PM EST
Crossposted from Slugger O'Toole
In preparing for the Slugger end of year review I had a quick look back at the 74 OPs I published on Slugger during the year to refresh my memory of the key events of the year, or at least those that grabbed my attention.
by Frank Schnittger
Tue Dec 3rd, 2024 at 12:05:58 PM EST
Cross-posted from Slugger O'Toole
Our esteemed founder and Editor, Mick Fealty, has an opinion piece up entitled If Election 2024 is anything to go by Fianna Fáil's slow growth approach seems to be working just fine which is a tendentious reading of the election result, if not downright misleading.
